IT Asset Management Overview & Fundamentals
About 20% of the CIS-HAM exam — see all 5 domains.
- ITAM = governance of an asset's financial, contractual, and inventory lifecycle. ServiceNow splits it into Hardware Asset Management (HAM/HAM Pro) for physical IT assets, Software Asset Management (SAM) for licenses/entitlements, and (separately) Enterprise Asset Management (EAM) for non-IT operational/facilities assets.
- HAM Pro is the licensed Store application (
sn_hamp) that adds the Hardware Asset Workspace, lifecycle automation (refresh, reclamation, RMA, loaner and disposal orders, asset audits), hardware model normalization, and life cycle content. Stockrooms, transfer orders, and stock rules come with base Asset Management (com.snc.asset_management), not HAM Pro. - Asset vs CI (repeated because it is foundational): asset = finance/contract/inventory; CI = operations/service relationships; synced one-to-one via
ci/assetreferences. - Roles to recognize: asset manager (
asset), and HAM-specific roles (such assn_hamp.ham_userandham_admin) for workspace and admin functions; least-privilege assignment is best practice.
Sample questions from this domain
Three of the 60 in this domain, with the reasoning. The full set is in the question bank.
Which ServiceNow application is specifically designed to manage the lifecycle of physical IT assets such as laptops, servers, and mobile devices?
- A. Configuration Management Database (CMDB)
- B. Hardware Asset Management (HAM Pro) ✓
- C. Software Asset Management (SAM)
- D. Enterprise Asset Management (EAM)
Why: HAM Pro is purpose-built to manage the full lifecycle of physical IT hardware assets, from request and procurement through deployment and disposal. The CMDB stores configuration items and their relationships but does not run the hardware asset lifecycle (procurement, stock, disposal). Software Asset Management manages software licenses and entitlements, not physical hardware. Enterprise Asset Management manages non-IT operational assets such as facilities and plant equipment.
What is the primary distinction between an Asset record and a Configuration Item (CI) in ServiceNow?
- A. An Asset tracks the financial and contractual aspects, while a CI tracks the operational and service relationships ✓
- B. An Asset tracks operational status and service dependencies, while a CI tracks the purchase cost, contracts, and depreciation
- C. An Asset is created only for leased or purchased devices, while a CI is created for every device that Discovery finds
- D. An Asset is stored in the CMDB class tables such as cmdb_ci_computer, while a CI is stored in the alm_asset table hierarchy
Why: Assets focus on financial, contractual, and inventory attributes (cost, purchase order, contract, lifecycle state), while CIs focus on operational use and relationships within services. Saying the asset tracks dependencies and the CI tracks cost reverses the two roles. Assets are not limited to leased or purchased devices, and CIs are not only created by Discovery; the distinction is about purpose, not source. The table claim is also reversed: assets live in alm_asset and its extensions, and CIs live in the cmdb_ci class tables.
When a hardware asset is created and synchronized with a CI, which field maintains the relationship between the alm_hardware record and its corresponding cmdb_ci record?
- A. The Model field on the asset, matched to the Model ID field on the CI record
- B. The Serial number field, which the system matches between the asset record and the CI record
- C. A cmdb_rel_ci relationship record created between the asset and the CI
- D. The CI field (ci) on the asset record, paired with the Asset field on the CI ✓
Why: The asset record references its CI through the ci field, and the CI references back through its asset field, maintaining a one-to-one synchronized relationship. Model and Model ID classify both records by product but are shared by every unit of that model, so they cannot link one specific asset to one specific CI. Serial numbers often match but are attributes, not the reference that links the records. cmdb_rel_ci stores relationships between CIs (such as Runs on), not the link between an asset and its CI.